Wall Street is projecting the company will post $41.36bn in revenue on $5.21 in earnings per share
Meta is set to report its first quarter earnings on Wednesday after the bell, and investors will be looking for news on whether the company met its quarterly revenue goals of somewhere between $39.5bn and $41.8bn.
Wall Street is projecting the company will post $41.36bn in revenue on $5.21 in earnings per share.
Continue reading...Report finds over a quarter of Canadians exposed to ‘more sophisticated and more politically polarizing’ fake content
More than a quarter of Canadians have been exposed to fake political content on social media that is “more sophisticated and more politically polarizing” as the country prepares to vote in a federal election, researchers have found, warning that platforms must increase protections amid a “dramatic acceleration” of online disinformation in the final weeks of the campaign.
In a new report released on Friday, Canada’s Media Ecosystem Observatory found a growing number of Facebook ads impersonating legitimate news sources were instead promoting fraudulent investment schemes, often involving cryptocurrency.
Continue reading...Analysis finds Amazon, Meta, Alphabet, Netflix, Apple and Microsoft averaged 18.8%, compared with 29.7% US average
The big American tech firms known as the “Silicon Six” have been accused of paying almost $278bn (£211bn) less corporate income tax in the past decade compared with the statutory rate for US companies making the same profits.
Amazon, Meta, Alphabet, Netflix, Apple and Microsoft generated $11tn of revenue and $2.5tn of profits over the past 10 years.
Continue reading...Under-16s will be barred from using the app’s Live feature unless they have parental permission
Meta is expanding its safety measures for teenagers on Instagram with a block on livestreaming, as the social media company extends its under-18 safeguards to the Facebook and Messenger platforms.
Under-16s will be barred from using Instagram’s Live feature unless they have parental permission. They will also require parental permission to turn off a feature that blurs images containing suspected nudity in their direct messages.
Continue reading...California cases over AI trainers’ use of work by writers including Ta-Nehisi Coates and Michael Chabon transferred to consolidate with New York suits from John Grisham and Jonathan Franzen and more
Twelve US copyright cases against OpenAI and Microsoft have been consolidated in New York, despite most of the authors and news outlets suing the companies being opposed to centralisation.
A transfer order made by the US judicial panel on multidistrict litigation on Thursday said that centralisation will “allow a single judge to coordinate discovery, streamline pretrial proceedings, and eliminate inconsistent rulings”.
Continue reading...Son of murdered academic calls on Facebook owner to ‘radically change how it moderates dangerous content’
Meta faces a $2.4bn (£1.8bn) lawsuit accusing the Facebook owner of inflaming violence in Ethiopia after the Kenyan high court said a legal case against the US tech group could go ahead.
The case brought by two Ethiopian nationals calls on Facebook to alter its algorithm to stop promoting hateful material and incitement to violence, as well as hiring more content moderators in Africa. It is also seeking a $2.4bn “restitution fund” for victims of hate and violence incited on Facebook.
Continue reading...While it is unknown if any Australians have been targeted, the military-grade program from Paragon Solutions provides full access to encrypted messaging apps
Australian government agencies could be customers of military-grade spyware from Israeli firm Paragon Solutions, a new report suggests.
In January, Meta revealed more than 90 people, including journalists, had their WhatsApp compromised by the software, although it is unknown if any Australians were targeted.
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Continue reading...Alvaro Bedoya points to ‘interesting coincidence’ that he was dismissed after criticizing Amazon’s Jeff Bezos
A day after his abrupt firing by Donald Trump from the Federal Trade Commission, Alvaro Bedoya raised questions about the US president’s relations with some of the country’s richest men.
Appearing at a hearing of the joint judiciary committee of the state legislature in Colorado on Wednesday, the ousted Democratic commissioner said it was an “interesting coincidence” his final public statement in post had blasted Jeff Bezos, the Amazon founder.
Continue reading...Former sponsors walk away from 2025 event – while organisers say they do not meet partnership requirements
Google and Meta do not meet the requirements to partner with the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, the organisation has said, after the two tech giants ended their official involvement and ditched diversity obligations in the US.
At the 47th annual Mardi Gras parade up Oxford Street next Saturday, a notable absence will be the two tech firms, previously event sponsors.
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Continue reading...Project Waterworth, which involves cable longer than Earth’s circumference, to also reach South Africa and Brazil
Meta has announced plans to build the world’s longest underwater cable project, which aims to connect the US, India, South Africa, Brazil and other regions.
The tech company said Project Waterworth involved a 50,000km (31,000-mile) subsea cable, which is longer than the Earth’s circumference.
Continue reading...After WhatsApp claimed 90 users were targeted last year, experts concerned over how US could use cyberweapons
Even as WhatsApp celebrated a major legal victory in December against NSO Group, the Israeli maker of one of the world’s most powerful cyberweapons, a new threat was detected, this time involving another Israel-based company that has previously agreed contracts with democratic governments around the world – including the US.
Late in January, WhatsApp claimed that 90 of its users, including some journalists and members of civil society, were targeted last year by spyware made by a company called Paragon Solutions. The allegation is raising urgent questions about how Paragon’s government clients are using the powerful hacking tool.
Continue reading...Experts say use of groups to warn others about dangerous men is indictment on governments’ failure to keep women safe
“Any info on Chris* please? Thanks.” The words in a Facebook post, above three pictures of a man. In the comments, a woman replies: “He was also posted a few days ago by someone.”
Further down, a second woman replies: “I’m shaking, I’m his fiancee.”
Continue reading...Messaging app said it had ‘high confidence’ some users were targeted and ‘possibly compromised’ by Paragon Solutions spyware
Nearly 100 journalists and other members of civil society using WhatsApp, the popular messaging app owned by Meta, were targeted by spyware owned by Paragon Solutions, an Israeli maker of hacking software, the company alleged today.
The journalists and other civil society members were being alerted of a possible breach of their devices, with WhatsApp telling the Guardian it had “high confidence” that the users in question had been targeted and “possibly compromised”.
Continue reading...Zuckerberg likely to be asked about plans to spend $60-65bn on AI in 2025 as tech giant faces increased competition
Meta will report earnings for the fourth quarter of 2024 after US stock markets close on Wednesday.
Analysts will probably ask about Mark Zuckerberg’s plans to spend between $60bn and $65bn on AI infrastructure in 2025. That is up from the $50bn the CEO said he expected to spend at the end of last quarter. But as Meta faces increased competition, especially from new player DeepSeek AI, the company is ramping up its AI efforts.
Continue reading...Former Trump White House adviser says supplication akin to Japanese surrender to allied forces in September 1945
Steve Bannon, the former Trump White House chief strategist, has described the tech titans gathering at Monday’s inauguration as “supplicants” to Donald Trump making “an official surrender”, akin to the Japanese surrender to allied forces on the deck of the USS Missouri in September 1945.
Bannon, who served as architect of Trump’s 2016 presidential win but later fell out with the president-elect after he criticized his intellect and members of his family, told ABC News in an interview airing Sunday that Trump “broke the oligarchs” who had previously been aligned against him.
Continue reading...London mayor calls for stricter laws on harmful online content and takes aim at Elon Musk
The west must face up to a century-defining battle against a resurgent far right that is on the march across the developed world, Sadiq Khan warns today, as he calls on ministers to take on extremism ahead of Donald Trump’s second inauguration as US president.
In the most strident rallying call of any senior British politician against the march of the right in the US, France and Germany, the London mayor warns of a “resurgent fascism” online and says that stricter laws on harmful content will be needed to stem the tide.
Continue reading...For middle-aged users, it will be ‘even harder to discern the truth’ among extremist content, expert says
Experts fear the decision by Meta to drop professional factcheckers from Facebook will exacerbate so-called boomer radicalisation in the UK.
Even before what Keir Starmer described as “far-right riots” in England last summer, alarm bells were ringing amid fears older people were even more susceptible to misinformation and radicalisation than younger “digital natives”.
Continue reading...Ian Russell, whose daughter died viewing harmful content, says Online Safety Act a ‘disaster’
The father of a 14-year-old girl who died after viewing harmful content on social media has told Keir Starmer that the UK is “going backwards” on online safety.
Ian Russell, chair of the Molly Rose Foundation set up in memory of Molly, who took her own life in 2017, said the regulator Ofcom’s implementation of the Online Safety Act has been a “disaster” in a letter to the prime minister on Saturday.
Continue reading...Technology secretary Peter Kyle has the task of making Britain a leading player in the AI revolution, but says economic growth will not come at the cost of online safety
With the NHS still struggling, a prisons crisis still teetering and Britain’s borrowing costs soaring, there are few easy jobs going in Keir Starmer’s cabinet at present.
But even in such difficult times, the task of convincing Silicon Valley’s finest to help make Britain a leader in the artificial intelligence (AI) revolution – all while one leading tech boss uses the Labour government as a regular punching bag and others ostentatiously move closer to Donald Trump – is among the most challenging.
Continue reading...Senior cabinet minister promises not to dilute new measures despite Zuckerberg’s attacks on countries ‘censoring’ content
Britain’s new laws to boost safety and tackle hate speech online are “not up for negotiation”, a senior government minister has warned, after Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg vowed to join Donald Trump to pressure countries they regard as “censoring” content.
In an interview with the Observer, Peter Kyle, the technology secretary, said that the recent laws designed to make online platforms safer for children and vulnerable people would never be diluted to help the government woo big tech companies to the UK in its defining pursuit for economic growth.
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